I took a test this past weekend with Grand Master Evan Pantazi and now I have the rank of PL 2 from Kyusho International. I tested with 10 other people who train Kyusho at my school. 4 of us reached PL 2. 2 got PL 3 and the other 4 got PL 4. What an awesome year this has been. In November my school gave me Sandan in our style (American-Te). My school has added internal arts with Sifu Dave and some of the black belts are training with him too. I go to the best school there is of course! I'm a 62 years old female. So far I've been pretty good at adjusting regarding the age issue. Looking forward to another successful year. Just think, a few months ago, I thought I was too old and was ready to quit!

That's what's so great about Asian(ish) martial arts. They won't instantly make you a great fighting machine the way boxing or wrestling would, but in them, your sixties are the age when you really start to kick butt... As opposed to "the age when your hands start shaking and your memory starts lapsing".

Especially when I'm looking at the newer 2nd Dans, I'd say there is a big difference in skill and knowledge. It took me 5 years of training to get from Nidan to Sandan. Age has it's effect. Kicking, for example, is a skill that deteriorates with age and accumulated joint injury including age related joint injury. On the other hand, tuite, making things just flow and work logically, managing a class and being able to teach,explaining bunkai, being able to improve your art with knowledge from training outside the school curriculum, knowing how to integrate what you know into a cohesive whole... these things have all improved for me over the past 4 years.